Producer has first rights

The European Court of Justice has confirmed that national law in the EU should give the principal director first ownership of rights to exploit a film as well as first ownership rights for compensation of private copying. These rights include reproduction, satellite broadcasting and all other rights of public communication. Member states could make the legal presumption that rights would automatically be transferred to the producer as long as the parties were able contractually to opt out of the transfer. Where fair compensation was concerned, the Court said it must not be the subject of an automatic presumption of transfer to the producer. The UK has yet to implement any provision for that element of EU law that allows payment of discretionary compensation to authors to take account of private copying.